The Price of Revenge
by Damvladi
Summary: What could have happened if Clare had successfully awakened when she encountered Priscilla after the seven-year Timeskip.


"Wait Clare, it's impossible, she's too strong ! Let's retreat for the moment, we have to leave this place !" Deneve cried, desperately trying to reason with her friend.

"Raphaela and Luciela's attack is going to end soon. Run as far as you can when it does. I intended to destroy the organization with Miria and you all. But it seems that's not an option anymore." Clare explained with a solemn voice.

"What ? Clare, what are you saying ?"

"I'm sorry. I give up my humanity." Helen argued hotly of course, but she shot it down. "My only purpose in life is to kill her."

She released her hold on her yoki, and let it flow through her. Her body distorted and took on the form of her half-awakened state. Her left arm transformed, becoming numerous blades, different ones with a lozenge pattern extended from her right shoulder blade and her legs changed into long thin metallic hooves.

During their seven years long exile, Clare, in addition to the windcutter, trained and studied this form. She couldn't go past it, as strange as it seemed, this form was her limit. First, she theorized that being only a quarter-yoma, she just didn't have the capability to awaken like the other hybrids. That didn't stop her though, she was stubborn like that. As her ability to sense, hide and overall control her yoki increased, she became aware of a presence inside her.

She investigated, and found she had a second untapped source of yoki, one that ressembled Teresa's but ultimately different. After months of instropection, where she poked and prodded it, she eventually understood what it was and why she couldn't awaken. She had been reaching to her own yoma side.

In every hybrid, there was a human side and a yoma side. Clare had three side. Her human and yoma side, plus Teresa's yoma side. If she wanted to awaken fully, to have the power to kill Priscilla she had to use yoki from the second source, Teresa's yoki.

Reaching deep into herself, she grabbed it and set it free to run havoc in her body.

Helen, Deneve and Priscilla witnessed a veritable explosion of yoki. The earth shattered and the wind blew powerfully around Clare, dust and dirt obscuring her from view. Helen and Deneve, Having lived and trained with Clare for a long time, instantly sensed the different feel of the yoki that was increasing at an alarming rate. Several seconds of heavy silence later, everything settled and Clare's new form was revealed, along with her yoki level.

Light brown hair cascaded around a softer looking face than previously in a hime style. Cold slitted golden eyes roamed over the devestation. Naked as the day she was born, you could clearly see that her body was almost unchanged. A pair of wide white feathered wings, four blackish-red metallic tentacles sticking out from her lower back, a large tail below them dividing into two tips and her thighs and legs having exposed muscles, the surrounding skin forming a scalloped edge were the only proof of her status as an awakened being.

"Ah, I feel so much better... That was the best sensation ever." Clare said with a softer, more feminine voice.

She was about to say something else but was cut off by Priscilla appearing in front of her, intent on destroying the very real threat.

This being's yoki dwarfed even her own, she knew now what it was Riful felt when they met seven years ago. For the first time in her awakened life, Priscilla felt the fear of death once more.

Her attack didn't connect, her arms reduced to pieces by her enemy's tentacles before it could.

"I won't make the mistake of taking my time with you. Just die and go to hell, Priscilla. For Teresa !" Clare roared in her face, all appendages on her body blurring into motion. The most powerful awakened being was reduced to nothing more than a smear of gore and blood on the ground in the blink of an eye.

Helen and Deneve watched wide-eyed as their friend took on her human form, the one she possessed before she became a warrior, and fell to her knees. They were shocked anew by the tears running down bright green sorrowful eyes.

"I did it, Teresa. I avenged you. Are you proud of me ? What am I supposed to do now ? I don't want to die. I don't have purpose anymo... Raki. Raki is still alive. I'll find Raki, I like him, he reminds me of myself when I was with you. He'll know what to do. But first, I need to eat. I'm hungry, so hungry. I've never been this starved before. I want innards. Entrails full of blood. It would be lovely. I'll have to eat a lot before I go to Raki, I don't want to eat him, even if he would be delicious, I'm sure. But where to go ?" She turned to her horrified audience and tilted her head cutely. "Oh, Helen, Deneve, I thought I told you to run, why are you still here ?"

"Clare..." They were too dismayed to answer.

The former warrior sighed heavily and smiled apologeticaly at her two friends. "Please forgive me." She said simply.

Understanding dawned on the two friends at the same time as Clare vanished from her position. Their heads exploded before they had time for any other thoughts, their slayer reappearing between them, her tail swaying gently behind her. She dived into their guts, ripping the ugly stitches apart, and put it all into her mouth. It wasn't really good, but the hunger was unbearable, and that was better than nothing. Plus, Clare thought, They were her friends, she should at least pretend they tasted good and finish her meal properly, common politeness and all that.

Once finished, she buried the remains, planting their sword as gravestone, and went to the Destroyer. She shifted to her awakened form and blasted its real body into next week. Since awakening, her yoki sensing had become the thing of legend, on par with Galatea, so she knew the demonic twin goddess were just a husk. Satisfied, she went on her merry way to the nearest populated town. She was still hungry after all.

* * *

Her hunger satiated, but not knowing where Raki was exactly, she went to his hometown and learned everything that happened there. She didn't really care that he apparently travelled with Priscilla, the bitch was dead. However, it angered her greatly that the organization took him. So much that she awakened then and there and flew to Staff at top-speed. She was surprised to sense three abyssal-level yoki battling against a large number of hybrids just outside of the base.

She was not concerned by them, though, the organization would fall for taking Raki from her. All fighting parties sensed her before they saw her and that made hybrids and abyssal ones freeze in shock. Clare landed between the two bigger awakened beings, one tentacle shooting out. It seized a random hybrid by the throat and brought her face-to-face.

"A young man was brought to the organization with two rod and an arm embedded in his back, brown hair, hazel eyes, named Raki, where is he ?" She asked with an edge of threat to her voice.

"He's inside. He's helping the trainee." It was a pair of young twin that answered her.

"Good." She released her captive and went to enter the base but a voice stopped her.

"Clare, is that you ?"

She turned around and found Miria to be the source. She was fighting a winged awakened being with Tabitha, Cynthia and Yuma.

"Oh hi Miria, what is it ?" She asked curiously.

"Helen and Deneve. What happened ?" Miria visibly struggled to find the right words.

"Well, long story short, Priscilla was there, so I told Helen and Deneve to run. I awakened. I killed the bitch but then I got hungry, and they were still there. They didn't leave me any choice you know. Their entrails tasted like shit, though, I would have been better off in hindsight. Anyway, now that I got my revenge, I'll destroy what's left of the organization and take Raki. Speaking of, you three, I don't know who you are and I don't really care, but listen, hybrid's, yoma and other awakened beings taste horrible, trust me, humans are so much better. However, you'll never know if you don't leave, because then I will consider you're helping the organization and destroy you, is that clear ?" She finished her rant by flaring her yoki.

Many of the lower-ranked hybrid soiled themselves in fear while some fainted outright and others gasped and let go of their sword. Two of the abyssals though, looked at her with contempt and attacked. Roxanne launched several spikes in her direction and Hysteria flash stepped behind her. The first's projectiles were blocked by her tail while the latter got its head blown up by her tendrils. Her wings extended and shot a wave of yoki powered feathers that easily shredded the former number 1 to pieces.

"I didn't have the intention to kill any of you. That's sad. Will you make problems too ?" Clare asked pouting.

Cassandra shook all of her heads in the negative, thoroughfully cowed, and left under the stunned gazes of the hybrids. The former number 47 nodded to herself, and resumed her way to where she sensed the trainees yoki. She stopped, though when she saw them walking out, accompanied by a well-built man with a face she recognized all too well.

"Raki !" She cried, reverting to her human form in midair as she pounced on him.

She crashed into him and hugged him as tightly as she could, but not too much so she wouldn't reduce him to paste.

"Wha. Do I know you ?" He asked confusedly.

Pouting once more, she poked him in the stomach, hard. "It's me, Clare ! Don't tell me you forgot !"

"Clare ?" He stared at her intensely. "What happened to you ? How are you so small ?"

"That's what I looked like before I became a warrior. I awakened, so I can choose my appearance to some extent. I don't like looking all grown up." She clarified.

"You awakened ?" He repeated slowly.

She nodded proudly. "Yeah, I'm the most powerful being living in these lands, you know. From now on, if you annoy me, I'll eat you." She joked, the inflection of her voice and her wide happy grin in stark contrast with the reality of her new diet.


End file.
